Telemedicine surging in US but still uncommon

Overall, annual telemedicine visits increased from 206 visits in 2005, or less than one per 1,000 people in the study, to more than 202,000 visits in 2017, or more than seven per 1,000. Most of this increase happened over the last few years of the study, with an average annual compound growth rate of 52 percent from 2005 to 2014

Telemedicine or Teledentistry if you prefer has the potential to greatly increase access to care and reduce costs. The linked article documents rapid growth in the use of Telemedicine.

At this time the primary issues holding back Telemedicine are state licensing issues and outdated regulations. For example we have been using Telemedicine with great success for our sleep patients. We see them for the dental sleep dental device after we have set up an online consultation and home sleep test with a medical sleep specialist. However Medicare requires an in person evaluation. As a result the patient (and everyone else) is inconvenienced, treatment takes longer and costs more to deliver.